


Fox Rain

by Milieu



Series: Femslash February 2019 [2]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drabble, F/F, Femslash February, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Injury Recovery, Non-Graphic Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-23 01:50:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17674136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milieu/pseuds/Milieu
Summary: The circumstances in which Éponine takes a bullet play out a little differently.





	Fox Rain

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt "Sickfic" for trope bingo. Technically an injury fic, but it's in the spirit of the prompt.
> 
> Working off the canon of the musical rather the novel.

As far as last thoughts go, regretting that you tried to do a good deed for once in your life might have been too typical for Éponine's tastes.

Her motivations for trying to do good were fuzzier. Rarer, perhaps, or maybe that was also very typical and ordinary, to not know why you did what you did. She'd been almost sick with envy, standing outside the gates of that fine home, resigned to helping Marius creep around so he could profess his love for some girl he'd only just met. She hadn't told him that she had known the girl he was pining after better than most anyone had, at one time.

She'd also kept it to herself that if Cosette found out just who Marius's sworn friend and confidant was, she might hate him. Éponine had not been an especially kind child, her head full of her parents' lies and games. Cosette, probably much like her mother, had been an easy target for simple, thoughtless cruelty.

Maybe this was what the pious meant when they brought up divine justice. Now Éponine and her cruel, miserly family were destitute, and Cosette had a mansion and a rich boy ready to jump at her beck and call, should she choose to accept him. They hadn't gotten quite as far as the confession before things went bad.

All of these thoughts went through Éponine's mind like flash fire when she chose to confront her father and his men. She had already known that she was most likely just changing the nature of the crime they were about to commit. She hadn't, and still didn't, know why she had screamed to alert the police. They didn't care for her life, even if she gave it up in some half-baked defense of a rich girl and her mysterious father.

It was the tiniest comfort that her own father hadn't been the one holding the pistol.

Scream. Gunshot. Fire in her breast. Scream again. Marius's shout. And from within the house, an answering cry.

Then darkness.

Éponine was hot and cold in waves, and her consciousness rose and fell with them. She could hear frantic words that she recognized as Marius's, but they seemed gibberish by the time they reached her ears. Someone else, another man, muttered back to him. _A doctor. Someone who won't ask questions._

 _Save her_ , Marius begged, and Éponine wanted to kiss and slap him all at once, but she was trapped in her body, floating somewhere far away.

As the men argued somewhere beyond her void, a ray of warmth and light wrapped itself around Éponine's cold fingers.

"Is it you, Éponine?"

Soft. Sweet.

"Please, stay with me. Stay strong."

She wanted to hate. She wanted to. She didn't know why she couldn't, when trying to help and love and do good had brought her nothing but misery.

Delicate touches on her face, smoothing her hair back. Cosette squeezed Éponine's hand in hers and tightened her hold even more desperately when Éponine's fingers moved weakly to squeeze back.

Perhaps she'd always been weak, no matter how street-smart and savvy she was able to become. Perhaps that was why she couldn't defy Cosette even now and just die.

God, she wanted to see Cosette's face again, up close. Like in those rare, shining moments when they were little girls and a glimmer of generosity and kinship would shine through in Éponine, and she would lend Cosette her hairpins and ribbons, fix her up just like a little doll, and for a few minutes it was almost like they were friends.

Éponine gave in and let Cosette's hand in hers pull her back from the darkness.


End file.
